Missed Connection
by carved in the sand
Summary: A split decision completely alters the course of Touka's life, and everything she ever thought has suddenly come into question. The ethics of an inethical world. - Touken/Yakuza!AU
1. i

**A/N:** _Just a little WIP thing I've decided to post up. I saw this fanart by this artist, and I was like...I need to fucking do this, I physically need to do this (THE BASELINE FOR THIS IS ALL PAA-KAA ON TUMBLR'S IDEA NOT MINE! I'll leave the link in my bio, at the very bottom.) This is my first time writing anything Tokyo Ghoul even tho I've been into the series for a while now, and...I'm so scared this is gonna suck. The reason why I usually write Naruto is because it's easy. So much unfleshed canon material for me to play with! Admittedly poor writing for me to fix to my heart's desire! But Ishida-sensei's work is immaculate. Like. If I disgrace his characters, I give you permission to flame me in the reviews. I honestly give you permission. I deserve it._

 _Suggested Mood Music: Jungle (or) Wednesday Night Interlude by Drake, In the Dark by Cathedrals, Don't by Bryson Tiller, The End of All Things by Panic at the Disco, Antichrist by the 1975, and Bite by Troye Sivan which I recommend the most. I think that's it. Lyrics from the fic are In the Dark by Cathedrals._

.

.

.

 **To:** Ayato  
 **From:** Touka

it'll be less than ten minutes. all I need to do is grab my bag from Anteiku and I'll be there. I promise I'll be there.

...

...

 **To:** Ayato  
 **From:** Touka

don't leave me alone

.

.

.

Touka trembled, clutching her cellphone like a lifeline as she stumbled through the front doors of the bar. She could barely hear the person behind her, his footsteps drowned out by the blood thrumming in her ears and her half sobs. The sprint up the stairs took too much time. Her feet took her through the middle of the room, around the coffee table and towards the black messenger back sitting on the couch.

"Touka."

Her head was pounding with a childish, heartbreaking plead. _Please don't leave please don't leave please don't leave_ , she pleaded to the universe. Her thoughts stumbled onto her tongue and out her mouth without conscious thought.

" _Touka_."

Just as she stumbled back towards the door, an arm caught her by the elbow, jerking her backwards. She shrieked in fury as she stared into depthless black eyes, but he settled his hands down on her shoulders, steadying her, quieting her.

"I won't," Kaneki said.

.

.

.

(I can't see you fall apart

you turn away and fade out of sight)

.

.

.

Touka has worked as a bartender since she was a teenager with a fake ID and a painful desperation for extra income. The summer before her senior year of high school, when Ayato collapsed in the middle of a neighborhood soccer game, coughing up blood, Yomo set up a job for her at a shady bar a few blocks away from Kamii University. Anteiku sat in the very heart of the city, a surprisingly well liked establishment that was frequented by mostly business men and graduate students. The owner, an old man named Yoshimura, whom Yomo trusted implicitly, allowed it. Within the week, she knew how to mix most of the drinks customers asked for. Within the month, she was taking double, triple shifts, staying up late and skipping school early to get in more hours. Between work and school, all her extra time was spent at the hospital with her brother.

Ayato hadn't liked it - a girl navigating the city at night on her own was _apparently_ asking for trouble. He would go on about how she shouldn't be neglecting her studies so close to university entrance exams, or missing out on sleep, or keeping him up worrying. He had that tired, pinched look of irritation on his face, knowing that she was doing this because of him.

Even with tubes shoved up his nose and IV speared into his wrist, Touka still felt the urge to hit him. ( _For_ him, she always has to correct, not _because of_.) It still manages to lighten her mood on the dreariest of visits. Some things, she knew, wouldn't change so easily.

She'd reached forward and held onto his hand and told him to shut up.

.

.

.

That had been two years ago, though. She's twenty now, with a respectably legal ID and two years of Kamii's Biology program under her belt. Ayato's in remission, Yomo's taken over the reigns from Yoshimura, and she has her own spending money that doesn't need to be saved up for crippling hospital bills. Her tuition, however, is another story, but at least she's in the same boat as many of her peers. She knows she'll be alright.

But all that was _before_ she got shot.

.

.

.

"It doesn't matter if you don't do well on this midterm, though. Your professor will curve the final exam," Yoriko says, Friday night, comfortably watching a movie in their living room. The brown haired girl has on a strange looking charcoal face mask on, and Touka frowns in apprehension every time she looks over.

"Maybe," Touka replies dully, standing by the front door, shrugging into her oversized leather jacket. She's gotten through her midterms today, and histology was pure _hell_. The ache inside her shoulders from hunching over her work all week refuses to go away. "Or maybe I'll do so bad that nothing can save my grade point average."

"Don't be too pessimistic."

"It's impossible. I'm about to spend six hours standing and being hit on on by idiots."

Yoriko shifts around on the couch, looking over her shoulder to watch her best friend, probably to scold her some more. Touka looks back with a neutral, _I refuse to partake in positive though processes_ expression, undoing the pony tail at the back of her head. Her short hair falls limply over her shoulders and she sling shots the hair tie across the living room

"Grab my dry shampoo," Yoriko says.

"Right."

Touka jogs into her friend's room, past the pictures of her parents and Ayato being discharged from the hospital. She finds the pale green bottle of dry shampoo on her friend's vanity. She combs through her hair and sprays the little miracle bottle into her scalp generously. After a minute, she shakes out her black, voluminous hair, half curls settling around her chin.

Touka goes back into the living room, patting at her clothes: phone and wallet in one jacket pocket, taser in the other, apartment keys inside her back pocket, and lipstick slipped into the breast pocket of her tshirt. She calls out a quiet goodbye to her friend, who reminds her to stay safe, and to please pick her up some banana milk on her way home, she's been craving it.

"Alright, alright," the dark haired girl says, closing the door behind her. "See ya."

.

.

.

 **To:** Ayato  
 **From:** Touka

You haven't asked for help with your homework lately.

 **To:** Touka  
 **From:** Ayato

I've been getting help from one of my classmates. It's fine.

 **To:** Ayato  
 **From:** Touka

Oh? And who is she?

...

...

 **To:** Touka  
 **From:** Ayato

"Oh" - the hell? And why are you assuming it's a girl?

 **To:** Ayato  
 **From:** Touka

Yomo mentioned a girlfriend, but I didn't believe it.

...

...

...

 **To:** Ayato  
 **From:** Touka

It's alright. We can talk tomorrow, I'm about to start my work shift. I'll come over to the apartment tomorrow afternoon. Sleep well.

...

 **To:** Touka  
 **From:** Ayato

We're not talking about shit. And tell Yomo to stop keeping tabs on me.

.

.

.

"-and then he says that- to _protect_ me? Because he has to _protect me_? What's that even supposed to mean?"

"Protect you from what?"

"That's what _I_ said!"

Touka shakes up Kimi's martini brusquely with one hand, the other supporting her as she leans against the bar's counter top with a forward's tilt of her head. The lights are low as usual, so it makes it harder to clearly see the distraught tears that threaten to spill onto her eyes. It makes the dark haired girl sigh angrily, but she softens her reprimand for her friend's sake.

"Will you stop crying everywhere?" The bartender straightens to uncap and pour Kimi's drink into her emptied martini glass. The brunette curls her manicured hands around it immediately. "Aren't you wearing fake eyelashes?"

"Four thousand yen eyelashes," Kimi spits bitterly.

Touka rolls her eyes.

Heavy, smooth music plays from the back of the bar, sexy lyrics that would have made her blush a long time ago. On this particular Friday night, the end of midterms week for Kamii law students, Anteiku is packed. There's loud conversation, laughter, drunken arguments, and several couples holed up into various booths, having their fill of each other. On a regular night, it wouldn't grate on her nerves, but something felt distinctly _off_.

"Refills, please," a business man says, leaning over the bar with two glasses in hand. He is squirms at the proximity to the half drunken, depressed girl. "Water and shochu."

"Yeah," Touka mutters.

She tucks the cocktail shaker into a shelf under the counter, and looks behind her for shochu. She takes both the bottle and the pitcher of ice water, and turns towards him with a neutral expression, though a sneer threatens to twitch its' way to life on her face.

His hair, somewhere between violet and a true purple, is terrifically neat. His ridiculously ugly white suit, black button down, and red tie ruins the sophistication of him. Never has she seen a man dress so terribly carry himself so _well_. Only an idiot could secure that kind of self confidence.

As Touka pours his drinks for him, he stares at her in a distinctly condescending manner, eyes trailing from her black hair to the navy circle skirt that sat over her hips. It isn't a glance of attraction, or lust, but of utter distaste.

The man slips away from her as soon as she's finished, several crisply folded bills left on the bar, several hundred yen too many.

"I've never seen someone dress so ridiculously in my life," Kimi gasps out, martini at her lips.

Touka smirks.

It's only the first hour of her shift, but tonight's still been strange. _Off_. Yoshimura told her to direct anyone asking for him to head to the strictly-off-limits room upstairs; the room that she has never been allowed to enter, in which Yomo and the owner of Anteiku secretively frequent several times a week, is suddenly a guest room. So far, a blonde with glasses, the purple haired weirdo, and a tall man with a swirling tattoo on his chin have asked for the old goat.

Each time, she directed them upstairs with a lazy point and suspicious eyes, but they ignored her. The four eyed blonde managed a tired glare before heading up.

They all came down together after a good half hour in a small cluster. The three of them sat together at the very back of the bar, given a wide berth from everyone else. They wore suits like business men, but there was something distinctly unprofessional about their little trio.

They gave little glances towards the exit every few minutes, clearly impatient.

 _What are they waiting for?_ Touka thinks. It makes her a little nervous.

She walks back to Kimi's side of the bar as she sips her drink, hands trembling just the slightest bit. Tears are falling indiscriminately now, and they're glistening like soft pearls over the sleek band of her lash line. Touka runs a hand through her hair.

"The both of us know," Touka says, leaning onto the counter with her elbows, cupping her jaw, giving her friend a bored look, "is that he's hiding something. Something big enough to scare hi. And maybe it _is_ dangerous. Maybe he only means the best. It all depends on what you think, in the end. Do you think you're worth more than a few half assed apologies?"

The doctor set down her drink, breathing deeply to settle herself. The tears still came, but her hands were still this time. She nodded virgorously.

"So the next time you see that shitty bastard, you give him one right between the legs," Touka continues, flattening her voice and raising her volume to normal. "And then you end things on _your_ terms. Not his."

"You're right...you're _right_."

"I'm always right."

Touka's straight faced as Kimi grins, bright and full of life and nearly herself again. She clasps her hands around her drink a little tighter before sighing.

"One day, when you're having your own love life issues, I'll be here to listen," the brunette promises, sweeping some of her sleek, short hair from behind her ear. Impossibly, there is something teasing in her tone, in the way her pupils begin to dance with light." Hopefully it's less irritating and more fun than mine."

Touka deadpans as she reaches behind her for a bottle of white wine as a couple walks forward, hands clasped, wine glasses emptied. "I'm a no-strings-attached girl," Touka says bluntly.

Kimi raises a brow. "A _virginal_ no-strings-attached girl."

"Who says I'm a virgin?"

It's still surprisingly easy to resist this sort of interrogation. She gets it every other week from the young doctor, who always frantically searches

Touka comes forward to the counter as the pair of girls slip their glasses down. They're pretty girls, softly smiling at one another as she pours their drinks, as if they already know where their conversation is going. As soon as they leave, Kimi starts at it again.

"You seriously think you can fool me?" the med student says, leaning forward over the counter. "And anyway, just because something hasn't come your way doesn't mean you wouldn't like it."

Touka rolls her eyes and snatches up a towel to wipe down the bar. "Relationships complicate things, and take too much energy. They're complicated and annoying.I don't want to be bothered," she replied gruffly. The bartender knew she was wiping down at the marble counter with more aggression than necessary, but she couldn't help it. "I'm busy trying not to fail out of school."

"True. Maybe _I_ should get into something without strings attached."

"Make sure you send him the pictures."

Kimi chokes out a cackle, smothering it with another sip of her drink. They start talking about the new lab that's supposed to be added to Kamii's chemistry wing the following fall semester, and after a few hours, the bar begins to empty. She checks her phone and sees that it's almost past one in the morning.

The door of Anteiku opens, a huddled up group of people trailing inside. Touka murmurs something else to her friend before looking up at the group.

"What the fuck?" she mumbles out loud, squinting.

The short young man that walks inside has a shock of snow white hair, as if he'd been involved in a terrible bleaching accident recently; it throws off the sleekness of his black slacks, white button down, and double breasted black coat that looks as expensive as all her current text books put together. He's huddled by three men, all noticeably larger than him. It makes her stiffen unconsciously. Their gazes meet, and his dark eyes look full and depthless in the low lights of Anteiku. Touka looks away first.

"What?" Kimi asks, eyes shifting to the side.

Touka shakes her head. "Don't look," she mumbles. "Some asshole with an entourage walked in."

"Is he cute?"

"He has _white hair_."

The brunette, fully bewildered now, shifts to look over her shoulder at him, but Touka makes a reprimanding voice in the back of her throat. Kimi sighs, but stays still. The bartender snatches up her emptied martini glass and replacing it with a wine glass. Her friend brightens instantly.

"What do you have?" Kimi whispered excitedly.

"Something old. From seventy six, I think. At least thirty thousand yen." Touka looks at the long shelves of alcohol behind her, back lit by an old, dim light bulb that forces her to squint to read the labels properly. She picks up the bottle of red wine and turns it over in her small, calloused hands. "Yomo said I could have it. Be grateful."

"Aren't I always?"

After uncorking the bottle with a sharp jerk of her wrist, Touka turns back around and pours Kimi's glass as the white haired man slips to the back of the room, towards the table of suspicious bastards. He looks rather normal, aside from the hair. He's wearing a crisp white button down and black slacks underneath an aquamarine blue haori, patterned with sakura blossoms branching out over the fabric. It made his skin and hair look paler. Not a single person turned to stare at him as he entered the room. Not a single person inside takes a second glance at him, strangely. It makes her even more suspicious.

Clearly, he's an important person.

Touka continues her conversation with Kimi and eyes him minutely. He goes to the table in the very back, already filled with angry weirdos, and his entourage sits before he does. They engage in conversation for a moment before he walks back, towards the bar.

His eyes are zeroed in on her.

She has the urge to tell Kimi that the weirdo with anime hair is coming this way, but Touka's paranoid enough to assume he'll try to read her lips (... _successfully_?). She knows Yomo can flawlessly, and since this group of degenerates masquerading as businessmen are clearly untrustworthy, as suspicious as Yomo is on his good days, she doesn't try it.

Instead, Touka starts talking about her histology exam for a moment, the fading click of the stranger's loafers coming into earshot.

"Don't be discouraged, Touka," Kimi says, swirling her wine in her glass. "Cells are boring for almost everyone. I mean, of course, the people who decide to work with them for a living are a different story. You'll pass the semester just fine."

Touka grunts, scowling in a way that she doesn't have to fake. "Maybe," she mutters. "I don't need this affecting my grade point average."

"Water, please."

Touka and Kimi look up at the same time to see the white haired man smiling calmly, politely, pulling his wallet from his back pocket. She's immediately struck by how handsome he looks up close; even, symmetrical features cradle a pair of dark eyes without discernible pupils, white lashes fluttering over pale skin. Though he is well dressed and sharp-shouldered, there is something soft and fine about his face that lends to an air of delicateness. There is a medical eye patch drawn over one eye, worn as casually as a watch, and she wonders what's behind it.

Still too strange looking, she decides.

Touka nods, and makes it a point to frown at the nonalcholic request before turning around to grab the water pitcher. Just something else to add to the list of strange qualities.

"Kaneki-san?" Kimi murmurs, eyes narrowing dangerously.

The bartender has the white haired man's - Kaneki's? - glass of water just as her friend calls out to him. Touka frowns as Kimi narrows her eyes in a dangerous, vicious manner. _The fuck?_ she thinks irately.

It's rare to see her friend this angry, if ever, and Touka doesn't understand the immediate source.

"Nishino-san?" Kaneki said, a frown twisting up his face. "Are- are you alright?"

Kimi slipped from her seat gracefully, pushing away her wine glass. "Where is he?" she hissed.

"I don't- ah, understand?"

"Where. Is. Nishiki."

Kaneki frowned more deeply, looking over his shoulder towards the back table, and Touka, still holding the man's water, watched as Kimi cursed under her breath. Her expression changed completely - fury gave way to heart break. She dabbed under her tear stained face, patting smeared concealer back into place, and steadied her audible breathing.

"I'll be going now," Kimi said thickly, voice full of emotion. She slipped the clutch from her lap open, but Touka waved away her attempts.

"You're fine tonight," she replied. Then she walked closer, placing the water on the bar counter, but not letting it go. "He's here?"

"He's _here_."

Touka pursed her lips, hoping against hope that Nishiki wasn't the purple haired freak show. The bartender said nothing as her friend swallowed thickly, snatched her clutch into her hands, slipped on the coat hanging over her chair, and clicked away on high heels towards the back of the establishment.

"...is she alright?"

Touka returned her attention to the white haired man looking bewildered and confused as he switched glances between the bartender and the brunette ready to rip her ex a new one. His wallet was still clutched between his hands, cleanly folded bills hanging out half way. She heaved a sighed, and set down the water.

"You know Nishiki?" she said, raising a brow at him.

The white hair man nodded slowly, carefully. His visible eye is blank.

"Then you should probably inform your friend that breaking up with a long time significant other by text is pathetic," Touka says dully, eyes focusing over the man's shoulders, the bite in her voice deliberate. As Kimi drew closer to the table, the blonde with glasses shot up, a decidedly panicked expression on his face. "And cowardly."

"Ah," Kaneki said, pulling his money out. There was a strange wobble to his voice. "And...and when did this happen?"

 _Why do you need to know?_ she thinks, suspicious all over again.

Thankfully, for a different reason.

"Probably" Touka says carelessly. He handed her the bills, and she took them, walking over to the other side of the bar towards the cash register.

Kaneki is silent, still standing by the bar. He clutches his glass of water, ice already beginning to melt from the warmth of his hands. Touka puts the money into the cash register and stares at him. There is a decidedly guilty manner to his fidgeting, his wide eyed stare.

She isn't sure why she continues, and a part of her chalks it up wanting to fuck with him, but she doesn't ponder it long. "Pretty shady, if you ask me. Doesn't even give her any heads up before calling it quits," Touka drawls, slinking back to his side of the bar. He looks up to her with a neutral expression. "Kimi knows he's been hiding something, but she kept quiet. Didn't think it was serious until he says that he's _dangerous_."

Kaneki's mouth opens slightly, brows puckering, and then he gives his own tired sigh. "Is that so," he murmurs.

It wasn't a question. She scowls

"Yeah. Pretty fucking suspicious."

The door to the bar opens, but she barely registers it. Touka leans across the bar counter just slightly, enough to catch his attention. His gaze sharpens against her's. Behind him, Nishiki is dragging Kimi by the elbow through the bar and towards the upstairs room, their voices going unheard. No one really pays attention.

"Almost as suspicious as you," Touka says boldly, the words coming out of her mouth without thought.

Kaneki reaches up to scratch his chin unconsciously, and with a start, she realizes that his finger nails are black. It tickles at her memory, the combination of his pale hair and dark nails and this ridiculous demeanor that is both intimidating and incredibly irritating. She's close enough to catch the lingering scent of outside's winter wind and something distinctly skin-like.

"Is that so," Kaneki murmurs again, eyes narrowing.

Touka looks away, pushing his water closer to him. Her eyes land at the flash of long, purple hair from the corner of her eyes. The woman that stands there is full figured and swathed in dark clothing, a pale, heart shaped face with features she can't quite make out.

"Do you need anything else?" Touka's eyes not leaving the woman that is opening her coat rather deliberately. There is something small and black there. Away from the dim lights of Anteiku's main sitting area, it's hard for her to tell.

The bartender doesn't hear Kaneki's next words. A cold tremor something distinctly _awful_ runs down her spine as the woman pulls out something that fits into the palm of her hand.

She isn't sure what slows down the world around her in the next few seconds, and hilariously, she's brought back to the adrenaline-pumping brawls of her elementary school days between her and kids twice her size. The lights go out completely. Her body moves on it's own. Touka lunges over the bar to grab Kaneki by the collar of his shirt as the woman aims and the loading of the pistol sounds in the back of her head like a bad memory. The white haired man makes a loud, strangled noise as she heaves him sideways to the floor.

The loud _crack_ of the pistol is just a moment shy of the hot, piercing stab of pain in her bicep. It's all a disturbing blur from there. Blood gushes, shrieks echo, and bullets ricochet.

 _Shit_ , Touka thinks as she falls.

.

.

.

 **To:** Touka  
 **From:** Ayato

Anteiku was on the news for some kind of shooting? Are you okay? Did you get home?

 **Missed call from: _Ayato_**

 **Missed call from: _Ayato_**

 **To:** Touka  
 **From:** Ayato

I swear to god if you don't pick up your fucking phone I'm going to your apartment.

...

...

 **Missed call from: _Ayato_**

 **To:** Touka  
 **From:** Ayato

What the fuck, aniki

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.

.

She wakes up blearily, swathed in white sheets and yellow hospital lights and aching skin. The rest of her body is admittedly numb in a boneless sort of manner, but she doesn't dare try shifting a muscle. There is noise that's hard to process, but it melts into the murmur of voices, and trembling gasps that just might be her own, and the click of loafers against linoleum floors. There is something that is just not right settling into the pit of her stomach, and it's not necessarily the fact that she was _fucking shot._

Touka takes her time with opening her eyes to the world. Then, immediately regrets it.

The bright lights make her shift away on command. "Goddamn it," she mumbles, feeling the throb of her arm echo all over her upper body.

"How are you feeling?"

Her eyelids flutter as she rolls her head to the side, where she heard the voice, and finds that movements involving her neck are just fine. A little stiff, a little sore, but still alright.

Touka glares.

Yoshimura sits by the hospital issue bed in a small, wooden chair that looks as old as him. It is a disturbance against the sleek, modern room around her. He looks down, a guilt-ridden expression on his face that makes her swallow back a scathing answer. It's a stupid question, but the man looks pitiful, so she excuses it.

"What happened?" Touka croaks.

"Our enemies have made...a grand statement, it seems," the old man murmurs out, his benevolent smile wry and bitter. She didn't like it one bit. "And you have been unfairly caught in the cross fire."

"Literally," she mutters on instinct. His expression grows more bitter, pinched around the brows. "What do you mean, enemies?"

"I mean," Yoshimura says, shifting his forearm towards her, unbuttoning the cuff, "that I have been hiding a terrible secret from you."

Silently, she muses to herself that she's never once seen the manager wear full sleeved shirts as he reveals his forearm. Her mouth goes wide, soft and weary, as his aged skin is revealed. The tattoo has clearly faded with time, but it is no less striking to her. An intricately designed owl takes flight over his wrist as thick tree branches and leaves stretch and thread together around it. Blood is stained against the owl's feathers, on down the tree branches, and even on the small, lifeless creatures that lay dead on it's branches.

She tries to force out words to no avail. Yakuza tattoo? Why does this kind old man have a yakuza tattoo? And why is it so _horrifying_? So gruesome?

"It's a long, convoluted story," Yoshimura mumbled, fixing his sleeve after what is probably several silent moments. Touka's mouth is still open. "I can only tell you my own part in all of this. There are others..."

"Kaneki," Touka blurts out. "The white haired one."

"Yes."

"And the blonde? Kimi's boyfriend?"

"Nishiki as well."

She nods, swallowing thickly. Yoshimura seems to understand that she isn't quite finished with him, so he stays, buttoning up his sleeve cuffs neatly. Touka breathes, shakes, and winces as the pain radiates. Yomo too, she suddenly decides. Yomo had to be the strangest of them all, if only because she knew him the longest. What was he hiding up his sleeves?

"I want," Touka starts, licking her suddenly dry lips, "my phone."

.

.

.

...

...

...

 **From:** Touka  
 **To:** Ayato, Yoriko

I'm fine, I swear I'm fine. I'm really sorry I get back to you sooner. I won't be back for a little while, but don't worry about me.

 **From:** Touka  
 **To:** Ayato

Focus on school. I'll be there to annoy you soon enough.

.

.

.

Thankfully, she manages to turn off her phone before she clocks out again.

.

.

.

Maybe it's the pain killers that muddle together her next few hours, or just how truly terrible she feels, but Touka finds herself fading in and out of true consciousness. There is no window in the pseudo hospital room she's held in, and without any way to tell time, all she has is the level of grogginess to compare to the first time she'd awoken.

Kaneki sits in the chair Yoshimura awoke in. He is slumped over in a distinctly pathetic way that makes her think he hasn't had the best night (day?). Touka zeroes in on the slim black cell phone he toys with in his hand.

"Give it here," she rasps out.

The white haired man starts, nearly dropping it. Touka scowled at him and stretched out her arm that wasn't bandaged. Kaneki pursed his lips as he pressed the phone into her hand securely, reluctance clear in the gesture. Their hands brush together more than she likes, but she's too tired to glare at him properly for it. His hands, at least, are warm, and comforting to her icy fingertips.

Touka holds the button at the top of the phone as she gives him a sidelong glance.

"You look terrible," she says offhandedly.

Kaneki looks up, white lashes fluttering for just a moment. The smile that stretches across his face is genuine, if not weary. "Not as bad as you, hopefully," he replies.

She narrows her eyes.

"Seems like you're trying to compete," she retorts. His smile, the miserable thing, grows irritatingly shy. Touka focuses on the phone screen that suddenly floods with light, the plain maroon background showing several voice messages from Yoriko and angry text messages from her brother. She has to scroll through them to see the bottom. "What day is it, anyway?"

"Monday."

She missed her morning classes then. "Shit."

Touka only manages to send a reassuring, minimal message back to her brother and roommate before her arm gets tired. She knows she should call, should make sure that they can hear from her own mouth that she is okay, that she will be back soon, and there is nothing to worry about, but a stressful phone call is the last thing she needs right now. She doesn't want to end up falling asleep in the middle of it or snapping on people who don't deserve her anger.

"I...I'm...," Kaneki begins, attempting to draw her attention away from her phone.

"Are we really doing this?" Touka said lowly, shutting down her phone once more. Staring at the screen for too long hurt. "It's fine. Don't bother, honestly."

"B-but- you-"

"-seriously, just stop."

"I _can't_."

Touka blinks at the emotion in his voice, strained with something raw and...

... _unstable_ , she decides. He trembles a bit, wide eyed and almost frightened. She scowls in confusion, but the expression drains from her face when their eyes meet. He looks like a deer caught in headlights, but a smart one - one that knows it's death is imminent, that it can only hope for something quick and clean.

"I- I am...Kirishima-san," Kaneki starts, biting down on his lower lip. It looked like it hurt. "I am someone that tries very hard to keep those closest to me safe. That is my... _goal_ , so to speak."

"Really," Touka mutters, lips pursing. It's hard to keep the sarcasm out of her voice.

He must have sensed it anyway, because he pauses. "I'm supposed to be keeping those precious to me safe," Kaneki murmurs. "And instead, I have...a track record of bringing others into the mess I've made. So...I am sorry. I am _so_ sorry."

Touka sighs. She wants to keep arguing, because the look in his eyes...grates on her nerves, just the slightest. Hadn't she seen the bullet coming? Hadn't her body decided to pull him out of the way? It was pure instinct with how she knew that woman was aiming at Kaneki's head. At the end of the day, less of a mess was made if it was her arm rather than his skull, no matter how thick and impermeable she's finding it right now.

"How am I supposed to forgive you for something that I don't even _blame you for_?" Touka said, supremely irritated.

He didn't say anything at that, but his smile seemed to say something she didn't want to listen to. Clearly, he finds it a more acceptable answer than dismissal.

"How is Kimi?" she asks. Then, she sighs. "What-what even _happened_ afterwards?"

His expression changes completely, a slow melting of normal human emotion to cold calculation. Kaneki looks away from her, toward the white walls of the fake hospital room like he can see right through them. "The woman that shot you is... _was_ after me, in a sense," Kaneki murmurs softly. "There was some commotion, and the authorities were contacted. She's taken care of now."

Touka blinks.

"So she's dead," she says bluntly.

His smile is dark and immediately makes her uneasy. "You're a very straightforward girl, Kirishima-san," he says.

"Just Touka is fine," she amends.

.

.

.

 **A/N:** _Y'all better tell me if I should continue this. Honestly I'd be chill with leaving this here and patting myself on the back for even pumping out this one shot when my life is so hectic rn. Also give me character feedback. Also dicuss with me the latest :RE chapters because I can't physically handle it (also, I"m so fucking tired of this lack of Kirishima siblings...I'm over it...where are my fucking kids). Remember to review!_


	2. ii

**A/N:** _I'm glad you guys want me to continue! Seriously glad. For the plot, I'm going to be using a few more of paa-kaa's (paa-kaa on tumblr) ideas while incorporating some of my own, because I was seriously feeling some of the ideas she had for Kaneki, his background, and other stuff. If you want more clarification on where her ideas begin and end, check out her "mafiaau tag" where you can also find the post that inspired this. She's a really great artist, so go follow her!_

 _Remember to give feed back!_

 _._

 _._

 _._

 **From:** Ayato  
 **To:** Touka

What the fuck is that supposed to mean? What even happened? Where the hell are you going?

 **From:** Ayato  
 **To:** Touka

Answer my goddamn messages

.

.

.

 **From:** Ayato  
To: Touka

Your ass is lucky Yomo kept me from filing a missing person's report. He's convinced you're fine, but I don't care. Get back soon. I don't have the time to deal with your disappearance act bullshit.

.

.

.

 **From:** Yoriko  
 **To:** Touka

Touka-chan, I don't understand? Are you alright? Do you need help?

...

...

 **From:** Yoriko  
 **To:** Touka

I'll get the notes from your classmates and give your professors a heads up. Come back soon, okay? Give me a call.

.

.

.

After a few days, she demanded to go home. After arguing with several different people, including a very fed up Kimi (who has no business being trapped within Anteiku along side her), and an immaculately stoic Yoshimura, that both insisted on her bed rest, Touka began to fume and stress in silence. Of course, in any normal situation, she would have easily complied with her health professionals. Touka isn't one to be unnecessarily difficult, and...she was _shot_. If there was ever a time for her to take it slow, it would be now.

However, this wasn't a hospital, she still hadn't replied to any of her messages out of pure exhaustion, and the meager amount of visitors she did get all got her nerves within moments of their arrival. She wanted to go _home_.

"I have school, you know," Touka said sarcastically as she toyed with her phone, thumb lingering over the _Call_ button. She'd typed in the number of the local police station, and was internally debating on how desperate she was getting. "Missing classes this late into the semester is suicidal. We're going to start reviewing for finals."

"Why do you keep complaining to me? It's not like I'm allowed to leave either," Kimi replied, rolling her eyes. She crossed her legs and gave the blonde standing by the door a narrow-eyed look. "Not that I feel like asking _why_."

"Because we need to make sure things are _safe_ ," Nishiki said through grit teeth, shoving his hands into the pockets of his dress slacks. He stood on the opposite side of the room, leaning against the wall in a lackadaisical manner that grated on her nerves. She watched him push his glasses up the bridge of his nose, focused on Kimi. "Whatever else you have going on is trivial."

"Like your relationship problems," Touka muttered under her breath.

"What did you say?" Nishiki snapped.

Touka dropped her phone onto her lap and closed her eyes, feeling a migraine coming on. "Everyone knows that there's no fucking reason why Kimi needs to be trapped with me. She wasn't targeted, and I'm not a critical patient," she said bluntly. His jaw locked. "I could ignore your bullshit if you didn't keep deluding yourself into thinking that she's _in danger_. The two of you aren't going to be talking any time soon."

"That's what I said," Kimi muttered, a dark look on her face. Touka bit back a smirk for propriety's sake.

"That's none of your-!"

"She _does_ have a point."

Touka opened her eyes again to see Kaneki standing by the door, hand against the door frame, looking directly at her. He was wearing one of his colorful kimono over his business attire again: this one was a soft sakura-petal pink with green hydrangeas, red clouds, and gold cranes, vibrant enough to hurt her eyes and make his skin and hair look paler. What really caught her attention was his lack of an eye patch.

His left eye, naked for all the world to see, was a filmy green-grey, lacking any sort of discernible pupil.

 _Ah_ , she thought. So that's why he wore the stupid thing.

It was more than just slightly disconcerting, but she decided that it had been more annoying to wonder just exactly what was behind it. Touka picked back up her phone, thumb at the ready, and decided that she wouldn't feel bad about calling the police on a half-blind man when he was able-bodied enough to run a gang.

"I don't open my mouth unless I do," Touka replied smoothly, sparking Nishiki a glance. He sneered. "Why are you here?"

"News from Yomo. It's about your brother."

Touka went still. The sound of her phone falling from her bed and cracking painfully loud onto the linoleum floors snapped her out of her frozen state, but she ignored it. She began to struggle into an upright position with her uninjured arm. Somehow, it still hurt unimagineably.

"Oh my- _Touka_! You're going to hurt yourself!" Kimi exclaimed, standing and reaching to press her back down against the bed.

"Stop it," the dark haired girl muttered, batting away her friend. When she was finally upright, she met Kaneki's eyes again. "What's wrong with him? Is he hurt?"

He walked forward, a questioning expression on his face. Thankfully, he said nothing, just reaching out to offer her his hand. Touka stubbornly shook her head and managed to swing both her legs over side of the bed on her own. She was panting afterwards, a shuddering mess of exhaustion and pain. She dragged the blankets back over her exposed thighs with little care for modesty, wishing the room was warmer.

"What's wrong with Ayato?" Touka said heavily, trying in vain to regulate her breathing.

"He got into a fight at school and broke his nose," Kaneki replied softly. She let out a breath of rattling relief. "He was sent to the hospital, but he's going to be fine."

"A fight?"

"Sounds like he lost," Nishiki drawled, condescending as ever.

Touka shook her head, sighing at herself in irritation at feeling the need to defend her brat of a younger brother. "Unlikely," she muttered. Anxiety still flooded her body, not subsiding in the least.

"He was hurt, but not seriously," Kaneki added. He looked up towards the blonde at the other side of the room, nodding towards the door.

Nishiki left without even a moment's hesitation, and Touka watched him wave over Kimi before following out behind her. She scowled as he left, unable to calm herself down properly inside of her little jail cell.

Ayato _hated_ hospitals, and she was just beginning to learn why. He'd spent most of his sophomore and junior year of high school inside one, too weak to move out of bed. She knew he'd feel better if she were there with him, even lecturing him about being stupid enough to get into a fight, though he'd never admit it. She knew she'd secretly feel much better if he'd been sitting in the chair beside her bed instead of the old man or Kimi or whoever else.

"He's safe, Touka-chan."

Touka blinked, looking up at the eye patched young man, colorful kimono almost hurting her eyes within the bright lights above them, noticing how comfortable he was with addressing her informally.

"I could be older than you," she points out, somewhat annoyed.

Kaneki frowns for a moment - looks away in an almost guilty manner. It makes her suspicious within a split second. _Why is he so transparent sometimes?_ she thought to herself, astonished that someone in his position could be rendered so irritatingly readable at times. "Yoshimura didn't say very much about you, but Kimi did mention you were a student at Kamii...so I did some digging at the university," he said quietly, lifting a hand to scratch his chin absently.

"Why?"

"We had an interesting conversation before you were shot."

"Don't flatter yourself."

He laughed softly in a flicker of genuine amusement, and surprisingly, she felt gratification in making the melancholy bastard look less miserable. "Interesting is too relative of a term then. I should say confusing," he replied. There was a strain to his tone, though he still smiled. "I wondered if you would be a danger to our operation, so I looked into you."

"Don't justify being creepy. The only reason Yoshirmura would keep quiet about me is because I don't need to be involved in your... _operation's_ bullshit," Touka said carefully, deciding that she wouldn't be laying back down any time soon. She wondered how long the old man had been involved with Kaneki, but she was still too reluctant to ask personal questions. "I have a degree to finish and a younger brother to provide for."

"Which means you're used to responsibility and extenuating circumstances. I was wondering why you had been handling all of this so well," Kaneki segways, making her scowl in confusion. He stares at her directly. "Your parents being involved in operations of my kind explains it."

Touka scoffed and rolled her eyes, doing well to hide the spike of tension in the air. "You really _did_ dig," she said, a sneer pulling at her face. "And not at Kamii. They were dead for a long time before I applied. The school wouldn't have them recorded on any of my files."

"But V would," Kaneki replied.

She very nearly flinched at the mention of the organization her parents used to work for, the name her parents whispered during late nights when they thought she wouldn't hear them, the name of the organization Yoshimura handed the reigns over to Kaneki. At twenty two years old, her mother is still very much a blur, but her father's warm, calloused hands were always accompanied with the splash of vibrant colors against pale skin.

"So the Yakuza's bureaucratized. Fantastic. _Get to your point_."

"Ayato wasn't attacked by students."

Touka looked him fully, focusing on his blind eye for a moment, the air in her throat too solid to pass into her lungs.

 _Of course_ , she thought, a blank sort of realization settling into her stomach. Whoever saw her pull Kaneki out of the way probably made their own assumptions about whether she'd picked back up her parent's work or not, and for who. Or maybe they just wanted to send some sort of message to the strange girl who decided to foil their assassination attempt. Or even-

"Not by _students_ ," Touka said, slow and careful, "but by people like you."

"He told the administrator that found him that the students who jumped him were wearing the school uniform, but he told Yomo the truth." Kaneki smiled painfully, staring down at his sleek loafers. "And as for 'people like me'...I wouldn't go that far," he murmured lowly.

" _I_ would. My parents chose to leave that life for a reason," Touka hissed, lifting her good arm to point a finger in his face. "You can't play innocent."

"I can't, but I can help protect you and your brother," Kaneki replied evenly. He walked away from her to circle the bed, and she watched him step out of her line of vision over her shoulder. She stared down into her lap and tried to control her breathing. "I have a few people stationed around the hospital right now, and they'll follow him back to school. I can offer you the same protection."

"You know as well as I do that other gangs suspect I only saved you because I'm involved. Taking your help would take away any doubt," the dark haired girl replied tiredly. She scowled as she stared at her white sheets. "Leaving is the safest option."

Touka hears him walking again, and she closes her eyes tightly, not wanting to see his expression. She is tired and angry and in pain, so much so because a stranger that probably thought about killing her out of sheer paranoia, and now she knows that the life her parents built for her and her brother for them has been shattered within the space of a few days. For the moment, it's easy to forget Yoriko, her classmates, and Kimi when she sees her brother's face behind her eyelids.

 _How can I l uproot his life like this?_ she thinks, tongue souring.

"Then I can help with that. I have an expert on falsifying documents that can get you the proper documents, and into another university without having to start over completely," Kaneki said, his voice suddenly much closer than before. "Anything you need, I'll provide."

"I have my own connections. My brother and I will be fine on our own," Touka muttered, just to make a point. She looked up, met dark eyes with a weariness that spanned a generation of blood work. "I...I can't accept your help."

 _I don't want to,_ she thinks to herself, feeling that she'll most definitely regret being in this man's debt. It was already bad enough that she implicated herself in him by saving his life. To take what he had to offer, to willingly put herself in his care was impossible. She couldn't. She didn't trust him enough for that. It was still possible that he would want to keep her around just to coerce her into picking up what her parents had left off. It wasn't smart.

Kaneki looked noticeably disappointed at her words, and for whatever godawful reason, an _I'm sorry_ was just at the tip of her tongue. She bit down the unnecessary apology as shivered against the chill of the hospital room. He held up her shattered phone for her to assess the damage.

Touka groaned at the three large cracks running across the screen, but decided that she could probably still afford to get it fixed.

She held out her hand for abused little device, but Kaneki just slipped it into the pocket of his slacks. "I can fix the screen," he said, nodding his head just slightly, turning to leave.

"It's fine. I can do that for myself," Touka said quickly.

Kaneki shrugged. "I insist. Besides, I can't make sure you make a speedy recovery if I'm stuck in a jail cell for the night," he said, a false-cheery tone to his voice. Touka's blanched. _How the fuck did he-?_ "That would be dangerous, wouldn't it?"

Touka stammered for a moment, blindly furious and instantly dizzied at the vicious flood of anger in her system, but she took a moment to calm herself. There is something like play along in his tone that she doesn't like, and the urge to flex her own proverbial muscles has her speaking in an unnecessarily threatening tone.

She pointed to her cast-wrapped arm with a scowl."As soon as this arm is healed," she said, warning laced with the venom on her tongue, "I'm coming testing out my left hook on _you_."

"I look forward to it," Kaneki replied. And somehow, he smiled.

She watched him open the door and leave in a billow of soft pink fabric.

.

.

.

It's a full week and a half until she's allowed to leave. The bullet apparently nicked her brachial artery, causing her to pass out almost instantly from the blood loss. Kimi had said she was lucky - no significant muscle or bone damage sustained from the injury. Nothing that would keep her from making a full recovery within the next two months if she took care of herself properly. It hadn't comforted her much. In fact, she was pretty sure it comforted Kaneki more than it had her.

Touka would be forced to wear a sling to keep from moving her arm properly. Doing even the simplest things would be difficult from now on. She couldn't stand it, knowing that she would be a burden to Ayato while they were trying to rebuild new lives.

On instinct, she thinks about school for a moment, and how she's almost definitely behind in at least one of her classes, but she manages to put that in the very back of her mind. What would soon become her old life wasn't a priority anymore.

Nishiki had been the one to lead her out of Anteiku and drive her back home. The angry, four eyed blonde didn't seem happy with the job - so unhappy that she'd refused to ask him to help her into her leather jacket, instead letting it hang over her shoulders awkwardly.

They stood at the doors of the bar, still closed, still feeling like shit, staring at the bar's counter. She could make out several different missing bottles and the faintest traces of bullet holes. The evidence of her attack pierces her, as well as the faint knowledge that he woman who took aim for Kaneki was dead without a shadow of a doubt. Something quiet and unsettling tells her that she'll keep looking back at this moment, this idiotic decision of her's, one way or another.

"Do you regret it?" Nishiki asks suddenly.

Touka doesn't turn around. It's the middle of the night, and the shop is lit up dimly. She looks at Anteiku's hazy ceiling, knowing that playing dumb wouldn't make this conversation go by any quicker.

"I don't like stupid questions," she says resolutely. "And I really don't like to see innocent people die."

"Pretty damn relative term if you ask me."

"Semantics," Touka tosses back but ends up ignoring him as she walks back towards the exit. _He was innocent when he walked through those doors and asked for a damn water,_ her mind whispered _. Who says he still isn't innocent? Who says you can't be a victim and a villain?_

Touka envisioned Kaneki's face in her mind for the umpteenth time, still not used to the milky green color that proclaimed his left eye visionless. The medical student in her decided that it was impossible to really know what was the cause of that sort of condition with speculation alone. The skeptical, cutthroat part of her knew that his job description put him at risk of serious cranial trauma, more so than the average Japanese citizen.

It made sense, and seemed more likely than just being born that way, considering the fact that he was an important person with serious enough enemies to want him dead.

The blonde opened the door for her, and she flinched at the blast of freezing cold air that hit her face and body, letting out a hard breath of air.

The bastard smirked. "You can take a bullet to the arm, but you can't handle a little cold?" Nishiki teased, brow raised.

"You can handle being in a gang, but not breaking up with your girlfriend face to face?" Touka says. The expression on his face is worth every ounce of freezing wind that makes her spine tremble.

.

.

.

 **To:** Yomo  
 **From:** Touka

Talk to Itori by today. We need new identification and documents for me and Ayato

 **To:** Touka  
 **From:** Yomo

Ayato's girlfriend isn't gonna like this.

 **To:** Yomo  
 **From:** Touka

She'd like it if she knew it would keep him alive.

.

.

.

When Touka gets home, dressed in unfamiliar and decidedly expensive clothes, Yoriko all but tackles her as soon as she opens the door. The motion jostles her arm painfully enough to make her literally scream, but all that comes out is a muffled sob. The girl steps back instantly, shocked, looking around for injuries.

"What did I do? What did I do?" she asks desperately, urgently, eyes roving around Touka's frame to assess the damage.

"Nothing," the dark haired girl replies.

The leather jacket draped over her shoulders hies most of her frame from. With her free hand, she closes the door behind her before shrugging off the jacket. The sling is a soft yellow and white that look ugly and uncoordinated against her dark clothing. She suspects it will have that affect on her entire wardrobe, but it's hard to focus on when she sees her friend's face.

"Oh- oh my goodness," Yoriko murmurs. Her hands cup over her mouth as tears spring into her eyes.

Touka shakes her head. "I'm _fine_ ," she insists. It's a struggle shrugging out of her boots, but she manages, meeting her friend's eye the whole time. "Everything is fine."

"Aniki?"

She blinks several times to see Ayato burst out from the other room, wide eyed and horrified, his entire body visibly rattling She grits her teeth when she catches sight of him: dark hair greasy over his forehead, skin excruciatingly pale, and his frame just a shade thinner than when she'd last saw him. It makes her almost angry as the speed of his pace slows, as if he suddenly remembers himself, finding a modicum of composure. The stress has clearly taken a toll on him, but to this extent...

He's clearly been awaken from sleep, and the tiredness on his face exacerbates how unwell he looks. The both of them are wearing their pajamas, but all the lights in the living room are on, as if Yoriko had been waiting.

Still, she doesn't have much time to think about this. The two siblings stare at each other uncomfortably as her best friend is all but forgotten.

"Well?" Touka prompts, feigning irritatation. "Aren't you going to hug me? Isn't that what normal people do?"

Ayato sighs, rolls his eyes, which are beginning to shine with wetness. He steps forward slowly and reaches out for her good hand, and Touka offers it to him. His glare warbles depressingly. She squeezes his palm as tightly as she can, and he does just the same, shooting a lance of pain up her hand. She ignores it to keep in contact with him.

"You're an idiot," he mutters, looking towards the floor.

"How's the nose?" Touka countered, brow raised.

Ayato sneered, but looked away, a grimace pulling at his face. Touka sighed as she let go of his hand and gently pressed her fingers against the bridge of his nose in different places. She asked him if he felt anything several times, and at each new spot, he declined. There was a new unevenness on the left side of his lateral side wall, leaning too far inward. It was just barely unnoticeable, and meaningless enough to not cause any lasting damage.

She reached for his elbow and pulled him to the other side of the room.

"Yomo didn't get to talk to me while I was...away," Touka murmured, a grimace on her face. "I want detail. What happened at your school?"

Her brother pulled away from her touch, his expression going blank. She sighed through her nose. "There's not much to it. They came out of nowhere. I wanted to go for some fresh air during lunch. I was standing by a tree one second and the next I was on the ground," Ayato murmured. He flexed his fingers and took a hitched breath. "One of them had a knife, but no guns. They _were_ wearing the school uniforms, but I could see the tattoos."

No guns. _So they were trying to catch him_ , Touka mused. _And not for ransom._

"So you made a run for it," Touka added, eyes narrowing.

"Yeah. Ran into a classmate."

That gave her pause, but only for a moment. "Kaneki said you were _found_."

"Who the hell is Kaneki?"

Touka scowled, heart stuttering in fear, eyes narrowing as she watched the stone-cold expression on her brother's face. "The bastard I took a bullet for," she replied, waving away the shock on his face. "In a minute. Did you collapse? Have you had trouble breathing again?"

" _No_ , dumbass. I had the flu," Ayato snapped angrily. She instantly deflated with relief. "It's just- one of my friends found me, and I told her not to say anything."

The dark haired girl stared at her brother for a moment, wondering if this friend had been questioned by Kaneki, or if she'd directly gone to him. Either way, it made her feel more secure in her decision.

"Are you going to explain where you've been the last week and a half, or what?" Ayato prompted, poking her in the temple. Touka scrunched her nose and turned her head away from his sharp nail. "You were _shot_? What the fuck?"

"It's a dumb story," Touka murmured. "And I have bad news."

.

.

.

 **To:** Touka  
 **From:** Yomo

Itori will have the papers ready in three days. I've started searching for a place to stay, but you might have issues with the emergency money. The bank will flag the transaction.

 **To:** Yomo  
 **From:** Touka

Won't matter if we leave quickly. I can drain the account right before we go.

 **To:** Touka  
 **From:** Yomo

Don't leave a trail for someone else to follow.

 **To:** Touka  
 **From:** Yomo

I'll call in a couple hours, I have work right now.

.

.

.


	3. iii

The dim, shadowy light of the glow-in-the-dark paint above them made Yoriko's skin look ghostly. The green tinge haunted her every movement with an unearthly, haunting light that touched her slim wrists and slender neck. Touka watched with nausea as her best friend took another bite of the small cake that sat primly before them.

She'd tried eating to no avail. It's not like she'd ever been fond of sweets, but at the moment, hunger evaded her.

"Nothing much has been going on. Aside from Ayato, I guess. Yomo took care of everything with your professors. All I had to do was deliver some papers from the hospital you were staying in," Yoriko had said, pointing towards the room's desk. Touka looked over her shoulder to see several sheets of paper left on top of her desk. "Those are you lectures from last week and this coming week. They wanted to make sure you'd have everything you needed."

She wondered who supplied the forged hospital records so quickly, but then decided that she didn't care.

They sat on the floor of Touka's bed room, in front of the queen sized mattress laid out on the floor, for which she'd never bothered buying a frame for. Ayato was splayed out on top of the sheets off to the side, barely enough space left over for her. His snores were audible but soft, almost feline in the way they dragged like purrs. Touka had been getting ready for bed, reading, when her roommate popped in with a cake in hand, wondering if she'd like some.

Touka didn't want _any_. It was also a not-so subtle way of attempting to interrogate her in her own worried way. But, the sweet was an offering of her presence. Her friend had been concerned for her, probably deliriously so, and it would have been too cold to turn her away even if she was exhausted. And Touka tries not to push away the people that matter these days.

So they sat underneath the light of her ceiling's glow in the dark paint, dotting stars breathing pale green light above them, lackadaisically devouring the chocolate cake.

Touka frowned. Yomo might have told to the truth with his falsified hospital papers. None of her professors this semesters seemed remotely polite enough to do all of that for her. "Guess I should thank them," she murmured.

"You _guess_?"

"I didn't ask anyone for favors."

Yoriko poked her mildly in her good arm, and Touka sighed through her nose. "It was still kind of them," she said sternly.

Touka knew that she should, but it just seemed like an unnecessarily awkward encounter that would almost certainly involve pervasive questioning that she didn't have the energy or social prowess to maneuver competently at the moment. Or ever, maybe. She'd just end up being rude. It would be much easier for her to just slip back into her labs and lecture halls invisibly, continuing on with her life.

"You're right," Touka muttered. It wasn't exactly a lie - yet.

Yoriko yawned then, for the third time in the past half hour, and it was a huge one. Touka rolled her eyes as the honey blonde's head bobbed back, her mouth stretching painfully wide. She shoved another bite of cake into her mouth.

"Aren't you going to class tomorrow?"

"Yeah, I am. I guess I should be in bed, huh?"

Yoriko smiled as she shifted onto her feet, taking the cake with her. "I put this back in the fridge, then," she said, reaching for Touka's fork. The dark haired girl let her take it, watching her as she slipped quietly from the room. "Sweet dreams, Touka,"

"'Night, Yoriko," Touka said softly, the first real smile of the past week pulling at the corner of her lips.

She watched her best friend leave, closing the door behind her. Touka immediately sighed, leaning sideways against the mattress and propping her arm up against the end of it. In the almost complete darkness, she could see mainly outlines of things, a few small objects coming into detail within her gaze. The book that she'd been reading earlier was the clearest - the thin, neat copy of Romeo and Juliet sat, a slim highlighter holding her place in the page.

Ayato still snored on blissfully.

Touka was fond of her life now. She liked her major, even if it was difficult, because the challenge excited her. There weren't many things she'd been good at academically as a child, but science was one of them. She liked her apartment, because it was cozy and warm and _her's_ (and Yoriko's, but still) _._ She liked her peers, because they were too busy and frazzled enough for her to hide in plain sight. She liked her best friend, because she was consistent and forgiving and kind enough to break her heart.

Touka grimaced to herself. It didn't feel good to acknowledge that once she was gone, leaving all of this behind would hurt. Badly.

"My fault," she murmured to herself, shrugging slightly. It was difficult, standing, but she managed. Touka headed towards her closet to pull out her second comforter. She'd already showered and changed into sweatpants and a t-shirt.

Because, really, it _was_ her fault. And it wasn't like she could have seen the ramifications of her actions the second she'd seen the woman with the violet hair take aim at Kaneki. Her own life wasn't just the only one she'd carelessly decided to toss away. Ayato was settled now. He had friends, or at least peers who knew and respected him. He had a routine, a familiarity with this city and his life around it. He was healthy. He was at home - he'd probably worked twice as hard to build a life here than she had.

Touka leaned against the door frame of her closet and swallowed thickly, spreading her hand over the wall and reaching awkwardly for the light switch.

The documents would be ready by tomorrow. A new life and a new identity for both her brother and her. Itori is never busy at Helter Skelter early in the afternoon, so she would pay her a visit to the safe at the other apartment before coming to collect her papers. The process wouldn't take too long if she figured out everything first, before moving. She wondered how Yoriko would be able to pay the rent after she was gone. Was she going to get another roommate? Or-?

The sound of muted footsteps against carpet- heavy, _booted_ footsteps, made her flinch.

But the sound disappeared all too quickly, as if she'd imagined it. The dark haired girl froze for several moments, waiting to hear the noise again. Her lungs had found their way into her intestines at the moment.

Again, the awkward shuffle of boots, nearly silent, as if a misstep in the overall direction, made her jerk in thin terror. Touka was moving then, sliding onto her knees in the carpet and quietly pulling out a shoe box hidden on the floor of her closet, situated underneath other shoe boxes filled with files. She opened the small cardboard box to reveal a hand-held tranquilizer gun, fully loaded. The sight of the silencer already attached to the end reminded her of her laziness from the month before.

Touka scowled grimly, sickeningly grateful. She was glad she'd never bothered to take apart the weapon the last time she'd inspected it - there would be no way to attach the silencer now.

 _Can't reload either_ , she thought grimly.

As silent as a ghost, Touka made her way towards the door of her bedroom, quick and careful footsteps. She pressed her ear to the door, and again, the shuffling became more distinct. She grit her teeth.

They were down the hall, towards the living room. Where Yoriko's room was.

Her door thankfully didn't creak as she opened it, tranquilizer gun sticking out first. From the very small crack she'd made with the opening, she couldn't see anyone, although the shuffling did become louder. Touka raised her weapon higher, pushing the door further open and focusing her aim as the blood began to rush in her ears.

The sound of a muffled, stuffy moan that could only come from her best friend pushed her forward.

Touka encountered the first one as he rounded the corner, jovially walking down the hall and undoubtedly scuffing the wood with his ugly black boots. She shot the tall, well-built man directly in the chest, and he went down. The muted thud brought an immediate silence all around, before the noises got more distinct. Yoriko's room door opened, and a hand reached out.

She shot this one in the arm, and he fell lazily over his comrade, an almost dramatic flopping of limbs and weightlessness as he fumbled to the floor.

And without preamble, she was sprinting, breathing hard and heavy.

Touka leaped over the fallen bodies as she entered Yoriko's room, which was slightly disturbed from the slight footprints on her cream carpeting. She laid half slumped over the bed, her upper body leaning over the side helplessly. A small puncture wound at her jugular was visible, the small mark beginning to slightly bleed. The bead of blood ran up her chin, towards her face.

Once she reached her, Touka dropped her tranquilizer gun and wiped away the blood on her friends face. With her one arm, she managed to shuffle the honey blonde back into her bed, gritting her teeth at the exertion. Once she'd managed, breathing hard and heavy, Touka picked up her weapon once more and watched her friend breathe too deep and too slow, curled up on one side.

The panic was starting to swell up in her throat, but she pushed it away, heading out of the room. There was a perimeter to secure, and-

The sound of gurgling had Touka sprinting back towards her room, this time stumbling slightly over the arm of one of the men she'd felled. Scrambling, she made it down the end of the short hallway and yanked her bedroom door open-

Ayato stood on her mattress, twirling a kitchen knife in his hands as she stared down at the body beneath him. The whole of her bed was beginning to be stained a bright, eye-catching red, a splash of life against the cool monotones and darkness of her room. He looked up, dark hair mussed, with sharp calculation.

"Oops," he drawled sarcastically, looking up to meet her gaze. He stilled the knife in his hand.

Touka sighed, bending over and placing a hand on one knee as she let out a breath she didn't realize she wasn't holding. The panic seemed to burst and simmer down all at once inside of her chest. Her little brother was covered in blood, none of it his own. The room was beginning to smell thickly of it, and every new inhalation seemed to clog her throat.

"Nee-san?" he called out, a question in his voice.

"Just...just bring me my phone," Touka ordered breathlessly.

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 **Calling:** Kaneki Ken

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Touka sat on her desk with slumped shoulders as she watched two masked men she did not know begin to haul her bare mattress out of her room. There was a small, quiet, yet very visible commotion going on outside of her room, and at the moment she didn't want to be in the midst of it.

The tranquilizer gun sat on her right thigh placidly, as innocuous as a notebook. Still within reach.

"How are you?" Kaneki asked.

It hadn't taken the One Eyed King to arrive at her apartment with a slew of people she couldn't really recognize through their masks, Yomo standing at sharp relief to Kaneki's immediate left. She'd let them all in placidly, Ayato sitting bored on the couch in his fresh (bloodless) clothes. She'd left the passed out intruders where she'd shot them, and then promptly went back inside of her room.

Of course, her intention had been to sleep then, having already forgotten the mess that her brother had made of her bed. But again, she saw the fresh body laying out before her, slit throat curved into an odd, second mouth smiling and bearing flesh. The sight was so draining, all she could do was walk over her her desk and slip onto it, knocking over her stapler and two highlighters. She'd stared at the walls around her mutely, and no one really had the gall to directly address her.

Never had she craved sleep like this before.

Touka shrugged, turning to meet his gaze. His mask was awful, an odd, horrific smile of bared teeth. "Tired," she said honestly.

His eye crinkles, and she can tell his smile is apologetic. "I understand," he replied. The sleep is still thick in his own voice. "I'm sorry."

She wants to tell him to shut up, but can't find the energy for it. She can only manage to shake her head and watch as her mattress full disappears from the room. They leave the door wide open, but now alone, she still feels a shade nervous at being alone with the yakuza member before her and she isn't really sure why.

"We'll take the ones left alive to interrogation and see what we can find out," Kaneki murmured, shrugging off offhandedly. It was as if he were moving through a protocol run. His black haori flowed with every soft movement he made. "I had a blood sample drawn from your friend to see what she was injected with - certain operations use specific tranquilizing agents that could immediately identify them. Four scouts are looking through the immediate area. We'll secure all entrances and post a guard once we're done here."

There were too many words coming out of his mouth, and again, she wanted to tell him to shut up. A headache was beginning to pulse at the very nape of her neck.

"You can start packing now."

Touka blinked, eyes narrowing in focus. "For?"

Kaneki smiled. "You'll need a place to stay for the moment," he said purposefully, turning to leave her room. "We don't have a lot of time."

"And I'm guessing that'll be wherever you live," Touka drawled. A sneer began to twitch onto her face.

She could see him shrug again. "There's no one who can protect you better than I can," Kaneki said easily.

Something welled up in her throat, a discomfort that made her so upset at being bossed around so passively by the likes of him. As if he knew that she had no other choice. And she really didn't, of course. Whatever dangerous game she was trapped in now, she'd relinquished her control the minute she called him. Willingly. But it was still hard to hand over her metaphorical cards to a stranger and watch them make moves for her.

"Just like there's no one who puts me at greater risk," she shot back lowly, tossing her tranquilizer gun off her thigh and onto her desk as she slipped back onto her feet. He paused, turning around, seeing eye assessing her.

"You need to trust me, Touka-chan," Kaneki said softly.

"And that's hard."

He nodded. She thought he was about to say something, the slight shift in his mask at the mouth, but Nishiki was suddenly at the door with a slim briefcase in hand and a sleek snake mask obscuring his face. "Kaneki," he says, demanding, and immediately she knows he has to get back to work.

"I need a moment," Kaneki asks.

"We don't have a moment. Ichimi's found something."

Kaneki turns back to her with another apology surely at the tip of his tongue, but she holds up a hand. "Don't," she says pointedly. "I'll pack. You work."

He's slightly surprised at first, but also pleased. His laughter is soft, roughened with sleep and exhaustion as acute as her's. He leaves the room, and Nishiki follows, pointedly raising a brow at her as he follows his boss back out into the hall. Touka flips him off with her good hand and watches him flare in anger for a moment before he disappears from view.

Touka sighs, looking around hurriedly as her migraine began to pulse more acutely.

This was going to be awful.

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 **To:** Itori  
 **From:** Touka

I'll come by later today to pick up everything I need. Around noon.

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Touka set her phone down in her lap as she stared out the windshield, the muted traffic in the dead of the night not as bright and not as loud as it should be. It was just past three in the morning. Some cities never really went to sleep, and for the moment, it seemed like neither would she.

Kaneki was beside her driving, looking oddly normal in his business suit and soft, expensive haori that fell over his slim shoulders. Out of a lack of anything better to do, she watched him drive, the grip on the steering wheel a shade too relaxed, leaning back against the seat and making lazy, practiced turns. A route he knew well. His eyes slipped back to her's every few moments, but she didn't really care. The midnight black SUV was seemingly too large for his slim frame and short stature, but he seemed to maneuver it with practiced ease.

In the two backseats, her brother and Yoriko sat asleep next to each other, both seemingly comatose to the world. Every time she glanced back to check on her friend, her stomach began to cramp in guilt, so she forced herself to stop.

It was hard.

"Are you close?"

Touka blinked, turning from Yoriko to Kaneki. She met his gaze through the rear view mirror, the awful mask thankfully absent.

She knows he isn't talking about her brother. "She's my best friend," Touka replied quietly. To deflect, she pointedly turns the conversation. "What were you doing in the middle of the night?"

He frowned, confused. "What do you mean?"

"You picked up on the fifth ring," she said pointedly, deciding that it would be easier to look at the road. "You were up already."

His sigh is surprisingly shameful. "Readings," Kaneki mumbled.

Somehow, she smirks. "You're a student at Kamii," she says, without preamble. The car in front of them is going irritatingly slow, and she watched him switch lanes. "It's a big campus, but if I've never even _heard_ of you before, then you're probably in the humanities. It was probably the first place you looked. "

"I'm a graduate student, actually," he said, grimacing. "Literature."

She nods. He doesn't look like he reads, but she ignores this.

"How normal of you," Touka drawled, leaning her head back and letting her eyes flutter close.

A apart of her wanted to reply more sarcastically, wanted to be callous for the sake of it, because there will be nothing normal about a man who kills people for money. But she'd already decided she can be as callous as she wants in the morning, when they'll both have more energy to deal with everything. And each other.

He's quiet after that though, because there's nothing really more to say.

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His home is large and expensive. Modern, with the large window that situates on the living room, covered by dark curtains. The lights are on inside, and soft yellow spills from the space between the two sheets of fabric. Touka eyes the second garage beginning to close as they pull into the driveway as she unbuckles herself.

Kaneki steps out of the car, suit and all, and Touka follows him. She opens the door to the back, reaching forward to shake her younger brother awake. He jerks, hand clasping down over her own on his chest, and the wide blue eyes drooping as he registers her face. From beside him, Kaneki carefully unbuckles Yoriko and carries her into his arms.

They don't bother bringing the duffle bags from the back. They head straight towards the front door, and Touka craves a bed. Touka has to slip in front of Kaneki quickly to open the front door for him, left unlocked.

It a short exchange of opening the front door, the small group of his employees gathered in the living room, collectively leaning over a tablet and swiping through several pictures that she can't quite make out from her distance. She ignores them though, because Kaneki is already leading her and her and Ayato further into the home. She wonders how some place so big can fit inside such a cramped city when he takes her down a wooden hallway. Yoriko is deposited on a bed in one room, and right across, Ayato is led to another. Touka watches for a moment as her brother stumbles sleepily towards the bed before closing the door behind him.

The circles under his eyes are almost as dark as her's, she thinks.

Kaneki leads her back down another hallway, a rounding corner, towards another door. He opens it, and this guest room is less sparsely decorated than the last two. She notes the studying desk placed neatly towards the side of the room, office supplies taking up much of it's space.

"If you need to work," Kaneki says, shrugging.

Touka scowls.

He sighs with a chagrined smile, but doesn't take long to amend himself. "My room is two doors down to the left," he says quietly. "If you need anything, feel free to tell me."

To keep any eye on her, she knows. He'd be an idiot if he didn't go out of his way to, because between her brother and her, she's _leagues_ more cunning.

It seemed like he didn't quite trust her yet either.

She allows it though. "Are you going to finish your work?" Touka asks casually, stepping further into the room. It's a blue color scheme, dark sheets and light walls. "If you have class tomorrow, it would be awful to just stay up."

"Not until the afternoon, so I have a few more hours," Kaneki says hopefully.

She nods, then turns, poking him sharply in the chest. It flusters him instantly, and he's backing away from her sudden advance towards him, taking several steps back over the threshold of the doorway. "Work hard, Kaneki Ken," Touka says dully.

"Eh- um, sleep well, Touka-chan," he replies, looking mildly distressed.

She's already closing the door in his face, so she takes none of it to heed. He's intimidated, she realizes slowly, through her tired fog of logic. He's quite intimidated by her. It's intriguing, but she sets the small revelation aside as she stares at her new, inviting bed.

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 **A/N:** _Wow? It's really been a year? I'm really a whole different person? I hope you are to? Or not, if you liked who you were last year._

 _Anyway, life happened. I'm so so sorry. But the good news is, summer is coming close. About a month of school left, so expect the next update in May. I'm still not sure if I really like what I'm writing so far, or what I've written before. I was initially convinced that this would be a Kuroneki Kaneki but with Shironeki tendencies as a sort of...blend between the two? And now I'm just like hmm paa-kaa's original idea was way more fun. This is so not gonna be fun. Just like how once I wake up back from this nap, I'll have to go back and re-edit the errors. Totally not fun. But necessary. I've been up since 3:40 ish for no reason._

 _Also, I'm about twenty chapters behind so no spoilers in the reviews pleathe. I beg of you. Hopefully by the next chapter I'll have finished planning out the course for this fic. Until then loves._


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